As extremely high bandwidth access networks become more accessible to residential subscribers, they enable service providers of these networks to integrate voice, video, and data, thereby providing more convenience for end customers and creating new service opportunities. Due to the multi-service nature of these new services, networks need to provide additional functionalities to end customers to support integrated control of these different types of services. For instance, a subscriber may want to join a virtual tour of a destination of interest through the network and have the ability to control the pace and contents of the tour.
Therefore, a need exists for a method and apparatus for providing network based virtual tours in a packet network, e.g., a SoIP network.